Bula Health Centre send SOS on unavailability of phone network

Unavailability of phone network in Bula in Wakhalika Village in the area of Traditional Authority M’bwana in Nkhata Bay has been pointed as one of the factors affecting safe motherhood in the area.

Chirwa: I have to climb an ant-hill to find network

Bula Health Centre in Charge Webster Chirwa said the health personnel at Bula Health Centre which is 90 kilometres from Nkhata Bay District Hospital struggle when they want to connect with district hospital for an ambulance in case of emergencies.

“There is no tower in our area which results into delays in sending messages to the district hospital and this result into mothers waiting for a long time while waiting for the phones to connect.

We are supposed to walk up to two kilometres up the hilly roads to search for network which is found on a certain anthill in the bush.

“We normally have to stand on an anthill for us to call for an ambulance from Nkhata Bay District Hospital and most of the times it is hard for the phones to connect.

Chirwa added that this results into women developing serious complications because the time wasted to reach the anthill when calling for an ambulance is such a long time for a woman in a complicated labour.

“The situation worsen during rainy season as we most of the times have to wait for the rains to subsidies for us to walk to run to the anthill to make a call.

“We sometimes encounter deadly snakes and my fear is that thugs will soon start taking advantage to harm us especially in the night. What we need is a tower in the area for communication to be smooth,” explained Chirwa.

Nkhata Bay District Hospital Public Relations Officer Christopher Singini agreed that the health centre is indeed far away from network providers and hope that a tower is erected soon to end the problems.

“Labour goes into phases and whenever there are complications at a certain stage, the health centre is supposed to call for an ambulance here but with no communication it means we will keep that woman in labour for long.

“This often result into the loss of mother or baby thereby increasing maternal and neonatal deaths,” said Singini.

He pleaded to the network providers to consider erecting a tower in the area so as to ease the burden on the women.